Kulnura 27th May

[RB (Andrew)]

Joe get those Pentax ready mate, it'll be a great evening.
Jakob see you there

[frogman (Anthony Lord)]

ill be leaving here at around 10 to 7 to go get chinese !
im having a splurge

[astropolak (Joe)]

On my way soon
Joe

[frogman (Anthony Lord)]

GUYS ITS DONE IT AGAIN !!!! bloody cold but its clear !
Come on !

[iceman (Mike)]

Beautiful, clear night! Transparency was great.

More later.

[wavelandscott (Scott)]

I knew it...I just knew that after I decided not to come that it would clear up and be great...

[Rodstar (Rod)]

Originally Posted by wavelandscott

I knew it...I just knew that after I decided not to come that it would clear up and be great...

It is always the way, isn't it? I have determined NEVER again to assume what the weather conditions will be until nightfall.

In the end, based on other's comments, I came for a few hours, left about 9.30pm by which time the kids had had enough (temp was about 5 degrees, which is comfortable for me, but not for a 3, 4 and 7 year old). I set up Noah's ED80, but he didn't even look - too much fun listening to silly CDs in Mike's car with the other kids; Anthony had a play on the ED80, though, on hands and knees (the EQ3-2 tripod legs really do not extend far enough for BIG people). I would have loved to have stayed later, and sampled more of the sky and RB's provisions (thanks for the coffee, Andrew!).

As others have noted, in the end the conditions were next to perfect, with only light dew, still conditions, and ink black sky. I had a wander around, enjoyed the views through some other scopes (good views in Joe's LX90 of M83 and M104). Jupiter nice and sharp in Mike's scope. Froggy's scope gave nice views of Antares (with a hint of the blue secondary). Thanks Anushka (apologies if my spelling is wrong) for cheering up Eva with a chocolate - it did the trick, and gave me a chance to pack up without her completely imploding! Nice to catch up again with Jakob and H too.

Thanks for the company everyone. See you in June, sans children I think.

[RB (Andrew)]

Last night turned out to be a great night for asto work.
After sundown the skies cleared and stayed that way all night.
I arrived at Kulnura to find Mike, Rod, H (Octane) and froggy setting up.
Since it was a busy week for me, I didn't bring a scope but planned to just socialise and wonder around having a peak thru other scopes.

I teamed up with H (Octane) and setup the "Hot Box" - my 240v power-plant.
The "Hot Box" was a workhorse, powering the LX90, the Dew Zapper with two heating elements, a DSLR charger, Octanes Laptop and a spare 240v hairdryer !!.
I also had an electric blanket on hand incase we needed to thaw out later
LOL the box was still going strong at 3.30am

H (Octane) set up his LX90 and eventually took some awesome images of "The Triffid Nebula", can't wait for this one H.

Mike was offering Hamburger so a few of us walked over expecting a nice warm feed.
Then we hear him say "here's the hamburger galaxy - ngc 5128 "
LOL and we were so hungry Mike.

All up another fantastic Kulnura get together and as always it was the company which made it so enjoyable, thanks everyone.
Hope everyone had a safe trip home.

[Starkler (Geoff)]

Im jealous !

The number of viewable nights here in the last month could be counted on one hand

[GTB_an_Owl (Geoff)]

I am claiming the credit for the clear sky guy's.
had an emergency job on sat arvo and came home all wet and grumpy.
was still cloudy and spitting rain on my way home about 5pm, so i dried off and went to bed, cursing the fact there would be no stargazing to-nite.
all those clouds ended up in my head, and i was even grumpier when i got up about 8-20pm and all the clouds were gone - too late by then for me to get organised.
glad you all got a good nite in.

geoff